The Cabinet of Wonders: The Kronos Chronicles: Book I (15 page)

They set out through the trees together, heading for the center of town. They talked the whole way. Petra told him about the differences between Okno and Prague. She described her family and Tomik. Neel’s voice painted vibrant images of the different places he had lived in, like Spain, Portugal, Hungary, and North Africa.

Once they crossed Karlov Bridge into the older part of town, Petra thought they would retrace their steps back to the Shorn Lamb and the market, but Neel led her in a different direction. “I want to show you something.”

He brought her to a square that was flanked by soaring towers that prickled with spires. In the center of the square, people were massed around a tall, slender building with a pointed roof. They seemed to be waiting for something. Petra could see only the back of the building, but she guessed what it was even before Neel shouted, “Hurry up! It’s almost time for the hour to strike!” They ran into the crowd and jostled for a good view.

Petra gazed in awe. The clock was even more beautiful than
she had imagined. As her father said, the clock’s face showed a brassica field rippling in the breeze. Golden Roman numerals ringed the dial. Signs of the zodiac, also in gold, flashed in a constant circle as a flat, blue plate made from lapis lazuli spun below the face. Tiny green copper dragons peered down from the pointed roof above the clock’s face. Their twisted tails were streaked with gold.

Then the silver minute hand and the gold hour hand reached the number five together. Jets of water sprang up in the air on either side of the clock, in the form of dripping lilies of the valley. Small children splashed in the water below. Melodious chimes rang. Above the clock’s face, blue double doors folded open. Small statues appeared in one door. They turned to face the audience. Then they disappeared behind the second door. It was a parade of good and evil. First came the devil, then an angel, then a miser clinking his money bag, then a woman scattering brassica seeds, then Death as a skeleton. Last came Life, a young girl who looked like Petra. She slipped behind the second door. The blue doors shut. The wings of the copper dragons fluttered like leaves, and a red rooster statue at the top of the tower crowed.

Petra was speechless. The clock was unbelievably lovely, and must have been very difficult to design.

When they reached the inn’s door, Neel said, “You know, I might be seeing you at the castle.”

“You might?”

“Yeah. I’ve been thinking about what Sadie said. I decided it’s about time I gave up picking pockets and tried my hand at a real job. Thought I’d see if Tabor could get me work in the stables.” He sounded serious, but his yellowy eyes twinkled.

“But, of course, you wouldn’t have to
stay
in the stables,” Petra said craftily. “I’m sure that once you got a job at the castle, you could probably explore different parts of it pretty freely.”

“Yep. And maybe I’ll get a notion of where the prince stashes his pretties.”

“Sadie and your mother won’t like it.”

“Oh, I suppose not. But there’s no reason for them to know, right?”

“I believe that would cause them unnecessary stress,” Astrophil chimed in.

“Most unnecessary.” Neel shook his head and sighed. “Sometimes adults just don’t know what’s good for them.” He began walking away, but glanced over his shoulder to wink at her. “See you later, Petali.”

I
HOPE YOU REALIZE,
Astrophil silently said,
that taking a job at the castle means you will miss the start of classes at the Okno schoolhouse.

And you can see how sad I am about it,
Petra replied. She marched across the inn’s common room, sat across the table from Lucie and Pavel, and announced that Aunt Anezka wanted her to stay with her for an entire month. “I’ll move my things to her house tomorrow. She’ll take me back to Okno.”

“Well, if that’s what your aunt really wants …” Lucie said. “We wouldn’t be good company for you anyway. We’re so
busy
selling our wares.” And Lucie launched into a long complaint that Petra ignored. She ate her dinner quickly. Then she dashed up the stairs to their bedroom.

Petra had been aching to try something the moment she was alone.

She emptied her pockets, placed a copper krona on her palm, and stared. Anticipation thrilled through her. Could she move metal with her mind, like her father?

The krona lay motionless in her hand.

“Float, lazybones,” she ordered.

The krona did not budge.

After a few minutes of staring at the stubborn coin, Petra placed it in her purse and sighed. Disappointment warred with a sneaking sense of relief. In the midst of everything else —a new city, a new ally, and a dangerous plan—she wasn’t sure she was ready to use the more extravagant skills of her father’s magic. She was not sure what using them might mean—about who she was.

“You are young, Petra,” Astrophil spoke out loud. “Do not expect everything to come at once.”

“It’s just … I spent all these years thinking that I didn’t care whether I had any magic or not. I never expected that I would actually have it.”

“I never doubted you would.”

“And now I don’t know what I’m supposed to do about it.”

“You should always do what you can. And I am not speaking about magic.”

Petra pulled the notebook from her pack. After looking at it for an hour, she could make neither head nor tail of it. The sketches were intriguing, but they mostly showed either things Petra had already seen (like the clock’s statues and water fountains) or things whose importance she didn’t understand. Petra paused when she saw her own face, and ran a finger along the edge of her penciled features. She remembered the statue of Life trailing behind Greed and Death. But most of the sketches seemed to have little to do with the Staro Clock. Petra saw spring flowers (like crocuses) and winter berries (like holly and mistletoe). There was a drawing of their home in Okno, a thin sword, a ship that had gears that turned paddles in the water, a house that stood on chicken feet like the home of the fairy tale witch Baba Yaga, a human heart that seemed split into segments, and a lizard with the face of a man.

Some of the drawings looked like blueprints of the clock. They
seemed fairly straightforward. Petra didn’t notice anything particularly unusual about the measurements for the dials and the face. But what completely baffled her were lines and lines of equations. Petra asked, helplessly, “Do
you
understand it, Astro?”

The spider gave her a mournful look. “I studied the equations during the ride to Prague. But there are no explanations for any of the symbols. How can I figure out an equation if I do not even know what the symbols stand for?”

Petra heard Lucie’s and Pavel’s footsteps on the stairs. She shut the book and sat on the pallet. “Fat lot of good that did.” She stretched out and yelped as the first bedbug bit her. “Astrophil, why don’t you pretend to be a real spider and eat insects?”

“What an unpleasant idea,” he said serenely. He curled into a little tin ball on the pillow by Petra’s head and fell asleep for the second time in his life.

T
HE HOUSEKEEPER
of Salamander Castle, Harold Listek, was a nervous man with watery eyes. Petra stood before the seated man, trying to smooth the wrinkles of her skirt.

Master Listek gave Petra a confused glance and turned to Sadie. “Well, what is it?”

“Excuse me?”

“Boy or girl?” He looked like someone who thought a trick was being played on him.

“A girl, sir. Her name is—”

“Viera,” Petra interrupted. Her own name was not terribly common, and she didn’t think it was wise to reveal anything of her identity.

“Well, if it’s a girl, then what the devil has happened to her hair?” he cried.

“The pox,” Petra said promptly. The disease usually made one
stark bald, at least until the sickness had run its course and the hair had time to grow back. Petra imagined Neel completely bald and tried not to laugh.

But Master Listek caught her. “The pox is no laughing matter, girl! Why, anybody would think from the look on your face that pox was your favorite treat! Like kolachki! Not at all, not at all. It can make your skin look like a cheese grater. I could tell you a few tales about court beauties laid low by a bout of the pox. Marriage negotiations wrecked. Reputations ruined. Of course, the pox can leave just a few scars, and one can live with that. Indeed. But how miraculous that you seem to have escaped the worst fate of the pox. Why, your skin is quite smooth.” He peered at her as if she were a horse he might buy. “I suppose that is a sign of good health, isn’t it? And good health—”

“Yes, sir,” Sadie gently interrupted. “She is a healthy, strong girl. I think she would be well suited to working with me.”

“Out of the question, my dear, out of the very question! Why, a chambermaid is often
seen.
And what with her
hair—”

Hair seems to cause humans quite a lot of problems,
Astrophil told Petra.
I am glad I do not have any.

“Perhaps a position in the kitchens?” Sadie pressed. “There she would have to cover her head with a cap anyway.”

“Hmm. Hmm.” Master Listek’s finger quivered against his lips. “Yes. Yes. I suppose that would do. Mistress Hild can always use another hand. Now, Sadie, see to it that this girl gets her uniform and makes it to the kitchen without falling into the dungeons or getting lost in a closet, will you? Why, the last person we hired somehow got trapped in a suit of armor and we only found her skeleton!” He slapped his knee and laughed. “That’s a joke,” he wheezed. “A joke!”

Sadie smiled creakily but Petra didn’t even bother.

“Thank you, sir.” Sadie began to lead Petra away.

“And the best way to stave off the pox is worms, I say, worms. You have to dry and powder them, mix a little bit in your tea before bedtime. I never got the pox, I’m glad to say, and it’s all due to the benefacting powers of worms—”

The door shut behind them.

“If I’m going to be working in the kitchen, I can always prepare a cup of bedtime tea for you, Sadie,” Petra said wickedly.

Sadie grimaced. “No, thanks.”

She led Petra down a dark hall. Petra didn’t feel as if she were in a castle. Rather, it seemed as if she were in a labyrinthine cellar with many doors. After she had met Sadie at the stables, the young woman had led her straight to the servants’ entrance, which was small and low. From that point on, Petra had seen only one underground room after another. Even Master Listek’s office, though it was decorated with a sad red rug and a few unmemorable knickknacks, was disappointing. Petra had hoped to find more grandeur in the castle, especially after everything her father had told her. But she supposed that the prince didn’t put much energy into beautifying the servants’ quarters.

If she was looking for grandeur, she didn’t find it in the vestiary, where Sadie helped her into a gray-blue dress that was her size, with an apron to match. The walls were lined with shelves of the gray-blue clothes. Imagine that every dress was one rainy day. The vestiary housed years of them. Sadie helped Petra tuck her sleek hair under the cap and said, “Take good care of your clothes. They are part of your wages.”

“What?” Petra objected. “Couldn’t they pay me with fur-lined boots? Or hot, saffron-scented baths? Or pastries?”

“Once a week you’re allowed to have a bath.”

“A hot one?”

“Er … it’s lukewarm. Sort of. After all the older girls—like me—have their turn in it,” Sadie said somewhat apologetically.

Petra groaned. She turned to the spider and pointed at her cap. “Well, get in.”

“Surely not,” said Astrophil.

“Where else are you going to hide?”

Astrophil crawled inside her cap and lay flattened against her head. “I am cramped,” he complained in a muffled voice.

Sadie led her down yet another dark hallway that looked almost completely identical to the last dark hallway. But this one had a large door at the end of it. Rattles, bangs, and various steamy smells came from the door.

“There you go, Petra. I’ll see you tonight. Enjoy your first day in the kitchen.” Sadie smiled. “And try not to throw any knives.”

The kitchen was a flurry of activity. Men and women were shaking pans over a brick oven fueled by wood-burning fires below. Several pots large enough to take a bath in hung in the fireplaces. Petra felt sweat spring immediately to her forehead. The other workers in the kitchen did not seem to notice the sweat dripping down their faces as they scurried around a large wooden table that took up nearly the entire room and was loaded with meat, vegetables, and cheese.

Petra asked a girl if she could speak with Mistress Hild. She was led toward a broad woman with a meat cleaver in her hand. Mistress Hild’s face looked permanently irritated. Wrinkles fanned out from her small mouth. When the servant girl introduced Petra as the new kitchen maid, Petra uneasily noticed that Mistress Hild’s right arm was more muscular than her left, the result of hours of chopping. When the woman set down the cleaver, Petra relaxed.